A considerable number of Counsellors of State and Aulic Counsellors.
Twenty Pages, all Men of good Families.
And finally a great many Footmen, and Officers of the Kitchen, Pantry, and Buttery.
The Duke's Stables are the best furnish'd of any in Europe. One shall not see finer Horses, or any that are better manag'd. The Hunting Equipage is also very magnificent; and I don't know one thing that is wanting. His Highness keeps a Company of French Comedians to whose Performance every body is admitted gratis. We have often Balls, Masquerades, and Concerts of Music. There
is an Assembly at the Favourite's House every day, where the Company plays at Piquet, Quadrille, and Pharo; so that here are all the Pleasures of a great Court. The Duke's Table is serv'd with very great Cost and Delicacy, and is commonly spread for sixteen Guests. The Duke sits at the upper end, between her Royal Highness and her Excellency. The Gentlemen are plac'd according to the Rank which they derive from their Employments, and the Ladies according to the Offices which are borne by their Husbands.
There's a Ceremonial observ'd here which is not known in any other Court, viz. the Duke's Ministers give place to no Foreigner, unless he be a Minister like themselves to some Prince, or unless he be a Count of the Empire. These have so distinguish'd a Rank at this Court that all who are not Counts must give place to them. A Count of the Empire, tho' he be a Cadet in the hundredth Generation, a Lieutenant or an Ensign, as it sometimes happens, in the Duke's Service, takes place of all Ministers and great Officers who are not Counts. This is a Regulation which her Excellency made after her Brother was created a Count, to the end that her Family might have the more Honour, and that the greater Respect might be paid to her own Dignity of Countess without a County.
I have told you that the Duke had transferr'd his Residence from Stutgard to Ludwigsbourg, and the reason which made him abandon the Capital of his Dominions; but why he preferr'd the Situation of his new Town to a hundred others that he might have chose more agreeable, is what I cannot account for.
Ludwigsbourg is remote from any River, great Roads and Forests. The Duke at first only built a small Mansion-House with two advanced Wings, so disposed that the Court lay between the House and the Garden; but he has since made great Additions
to it, and is actually building a large Mansion between the Court and the Garden, to which the Wings of the former Building are to be joined. One Frisoni, an Italian, has the direction of these Works; in which it appears that he is a much better Mason than an Architect. The new Building runs so far out that it discovers all the Effects of it. The Front of the Mansion consists of three Stories, including the Ground-Floor; but on the Garden side there are only two of a moderate Height, so that one wou'd take this Building rather for an Orangerie than for the Palace of a Sovereign. The great Stair-Case is dark, the Apartments want Light, the Chambers are long and narrow, and have very few Outlets. However, this single Building was undertaken by Frisoni for 700000 Florins, exclusive of several sorts of Materials with which he was furnished.
The old Mansion, which fronts the new, is not near so large, tho' it is three Stories high every way. The Apartments are small and too inconvenient to live in, yet no Cost has been spar'd to adorn them; Carving, Gilding, and Painting being employ'd in them with more Profusion than Judgment. The Furniture is rich, but of a very odd Fancy. The best thing in all the Palace is the Chapel, which would every where be reckon'd a fine noble Structure. But notwithstanding all the Faults which are observ'd in the Palace, it must be allow'd that whoever lives to see it finish'd will find it a magnificent Piece of Work. In the Gardens there are several Terrasses, which rising by degrees one above another, intirely bound the Prospect of the Palace. 'Tis certain that when the Duke's Architects saw this Prince resolutely determin'd to build at Ludwigsbourg, they ought at least to have advis'd him to place his Palace at the very spot where his Gardens end: In this case it would have stood in the middle of a Plain, the Apartments would not have been cramp'd by the